Double chin? Test your sugar level

A double chin, a buffalo hump in the upper back, and darkening, thickening of the skin at the nape of the neck can be early indicators of diabetes, a study done at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences has revealed. People with any of these three body markers were likely to develop diabetes over the next five years, it said.

“All these body markers are easily identifiable and we advise everyone who develop these to get their blood sugar levels tested. About 30 per cent of people with any of these symptoms would have diabetes and the rest would be at risk of developing it in the near future,” said the study’s lead author Dr Anoop Misra, HoD, Diabetes and Metabolic Diseases, Fortis Hospitals.

Today is World Diabetes Day. There are 250 million people suffering from the disease in the world, 40 million of them in India. Another 40 million are at risk of it, which makes it as common as the common cold.

The study was done jointly by the departments of Medicine and Biostatistics at AIIMS, along with Fortis Hospitals and the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, US.

Two of these markers for insulin-resistance, or a pre-diabetes stage, have been scientifically documented for the first time in the world.